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Year of Hell (episode)
Obsessed with restoring the Krenim Imperium, no matter the cost, a Krenim military temporal scientist creates changes in history that all but destroy Voyager. Summary Some time prior to 2174, the brilliant Krenim military temporal scientist Annorax, of the once-powerful Krenim Imperium, developed and oversaw construction of a weapon ship whose primary weapon created causality paradoxes by causing temporal incursions against species. Using this weapon ship, he supervised the erasure of the existence of the race that had removed the Krenim as the dominant power in that region of the Delta Quadrant. But the erasure of that race from history caused the near destruction of his own race, and his attempts to undo this led to the erasure of the existence of his beloved wife. For the last two hundred years, obsessed with restoring her along with the full glory of the Krenim Imperium, he and the crew of his temporal weapon ship have been creating one causality paradox after another, altering and re-altering history, erasing and restoring race after race. Now, in 2374, the , lost in the Delta Quadrant, 65,000 light years from home, has entered the region, and she and her crew become caught in Annorax' machinations. Teaser Day 1 A perfect day on a Class M planet. An advanced civilization lives here, as evidenced by a sprawling, technologically advanced metropolis. Suddenly, in the sky above, the business end of what looks like some sort of weapon appears. It fires a bright, bluish-white, shimmering beam of energy at the city. The beam spreads out, over the city and beyond. Every trace of civilization vanishes, replaced by virgin land, as if no man had ever set foot on the planet. Aboard the ship that fired the beam, a young officer checks computer displays and reports to the ship's commander that the 'temporal incursion' is complete; all organisms on the planet have been eradicated. The commander, an older man, asks if their 'target event' has been achieved. The younger man frustratedly reports no. The commander muses that more definitive action is necessary; he orders a course laid in for the homeworld of the species whose colony they have just eradicated: the Zahl. The entire species, he decides, must be erased from time. Act One Aboard the USS Voyager, the senior staff is gathered together in the newly-completed Astrometrics lab, to celebrate its completion. The former Borg drone Seven of Nine, recently freed from the Borg Collective, will be in charge of it, effectively becoming the head of astrometrics. ( ). She and the co-developer of the lab, Operations Manager Ensign Harry Kim, demonstrate its abilities by showing them a scan of a new course to Earth they have plotted that, by Seven's estimate, will slash five years of the several decades of travel before them. Chief Engineer Lieutenant B'Elanna Torres observes from the scan that they are entering a region of space with many Class M planets. Seven informs them of the owners of the region: the Zahl. Everyone is very pleased. But then The Doctor, the ship's holographic Chief Medical Officer, begins a long, drawn-out speech he has prepared, to their chagrin. However, he is interrupted when the bridge hails the Commanding Officer, Captain Kathryn Janeway, informing her of a hail from an approaching ship. All present seize the opportunity to bolt for the door. On the bridge, Lieutenant Commander Tuvok, the Chief Tactical Officer scans the vessel and reports that it is no threat; it is small, its weapons are limited and its warp capacity is low. Janeway orders an onscreen answer to the hail. It is a Krenim vessel. The hailer, a Krenim Commandant, appears. He furiously informs Janeway that they are trespassing in Krenim space and orders her to reverse course or face destruction, though his vessel is completely unable to harm Voyager. Janeway responds with a smirk and dismisses his threat with a disparaging and very saucy comment about the "size" of what is in his "torpedo tubes". The Commandant angrily cuts the communication. Janeway orders Voyager's course maintained, but also orders yellow alert, just in case. Day 4 Voyager has entered Zahl space. She is seen at all stop, with two large, Zahl ships. In the briefing room, a Zahl ambassador, a very friendly and engaging fellow, assures Janeway that there is nothing to fear from the Krenim; the Zahl defeated them over a generation ago, despite their formidable weapons based on temporal science. Their ships, he tells her, still wander Zahl territory claiming the space as their own, but they are no more than a nuisance. Janeway acknowledges this with a smile. However, as the ambassador begins inquiring about their epic journey, Ensign Kim hails from the bridge and informs Janeway the vessel has returned. Janeway and the ambassador go onto the bridge. The vessel hails and Janeway orders an onscreen answer. It is the same Krenim Commandant. He accuses Janeway of consorting with the Zahl. The ambassador angrily warns him to go away with a disparaging threat to seize his ship and ship him home in a cargo container. Janeway calms them down. But then Kim reports a huge spatial distortion heading for them, 5 light years across and expanding. Tuvok scans it and, to the Zahl ambassador's great shock, reports it to be a space-time distortion originating from a vessel near the Zahl homeworld. Flight Controller Lt (J.G.) Thomas Paris tries to take the ship to warp speed to try to get her away from it, but the wave destabilizes the warp field, making this impossible. The wave hits all the vessels. And everything changes. The Zahl ships vanish. The little Krenim vessel is transformed into a mighty Krenim warship. On Voyager's bridge, the Zahl ambassador vanishes. The bridge goes from pristine condition to red alert condition and looks damaged, as if that had been its state from the start. Lights flicker. Janeway and the other officers go from being relaxed but alert to being tense and disheveled. A crewmember lies dead on the floor. The ship shudders from the warship's fire. Tuvok reports their shields are at 17 percent. Before the wave, they were at 100. The Krenim vessel hails. The Kremim Commandant appears; but instead of being impotently angry, he is deadly confident. He offers Janeway the foregoing of the execution of her crew if she will surrender. When she coldly refuses, he warns her to prepare to be boarded and ends the communication. Janeway orders battlestations, remarking to Chakotay that "this is turning into the week of hell." Act Two Voyager is hammered by the Krenim warship. The warship's torpedoes connect solidly with her hull, penetrating her deflector shields as if she has none. Chakotay cannot understand why, but Tuvok supplies the answer; the torpedoes are not photon, but chroniton; they are getting through their shields because they are in temporal flux. Janeway gives the order to flee at warp speed, as they are thus defenseless. With that done, she orders a 24-hour tactical alert, and orders Tuvok to find a way to modify the shields against the Krenim torpedoes. The ship that caused the change in the timeline is, of course, Annorax' temporal weapon ship. With the Zahl having never existed, the Krenim were never defeated; the entire region is thus still Krenim space. The commander, Annorax himself, is in his chambers aboard. He holds a sealed glass pyramid containing a small lock of red hair. He gazes at it with evident grief. The young officer, named Obrist, enters and, with dignified excitement, reports that the erasure of the Zahl from history has restored the Krenim Imperium to 98% of the power it once had; 849 worlds over 5000 parsecs. However, Annorax asks him whether or not a certain colony, the one at 'Kyana Prime', was restored. Obrist tells him no; in this timeline, the Imperium's territory does not extend so far. He does so in a voice that shows he has been asked this question before, and has always had the same answer. Annorax disappointedly responds that they have failed then, and orders him to start calculations for another temporal incursion. Behind his back, Obrist hangs his head down and shakes it in an exasperated, frustrated manner; he cannot understand this. He earnestly pleads that they have never ever achieved this level of success in restoring the Imperium in 200 years of attempts. If they do another incursion, it could all be lost again. But Annorax sternly orders him to obey. Obrist acknnowledges and leaves, his body language showing silent, weary anger. Day 32 Voyager is chased by a Krenim warship. A torpedo slams into her 'neck' (the junction between the saucer section and the stardrive). The bridge looks in worse condition than before; apparently, Voyager have been suffering incessant Krenim attacks. Tuvok's attempts to modify the shields against the Krenim chroniton torpedoes have failed. But they get an unexpected opening: Chakotay notices the warship's aft shields are down. However Voyager's own weapons are non-functional. Meanwhile, the Doctor hails from the Sickbay and informs them that a power overload is occurring there. Ensign Kim tries to stop it, but fails. Janeway gets an idea. She orders Tuvok to arm 4 of their eleven remaining photon torpedoes and deploy them like mines. He does so. The gambit works; the Krenim warship runs into the free-floating torpedoes and is destroyed. But then Janeway's attention is drawn to the impending destruction of the deck that the Sickbay is on, due to the power overload. The overload spreads quickly; the deck will soon explode. As the computer counts down, the Doctor urgently herds his patients and other crewmembers into a Jeffries tube, where they will be safe. But, as he is about to close the hatch, he sees two crewmembers, Emmanuel and Strickler, running desperately toward the hatch. He waits for them until the computer counts the last second before the deck blows. But they do not make it. He closes the hatch. Much of the deck explodes outward in a huge line of flame and debris along the top of the saucer section. The ship is so violently shaken by the explosion that all officers on the bridge are knocked off their feet or out of their seats. Kim reports the destruction of 43 sections on that deck. Tuvok gives a casualty report, which includes the deaths of the two crewmembers that did not make it to the Jeffries tube. Janeway ends the red alert and looks around at the damage on the bridge. Most of the lights are out, console displays flicker, and debris is strewn everywhere. She gives Chakotay the bridge, "what's left of it" (sic) and goes to her ready room. Janeway's ready room is in even worse condition than the bridge, All lights are out, and debris covers almost the entire floor and her desk. Her desktop monitor is completely destroyed. Chakotay comes to see her. He advises her that they and the crew should abandon ship; their strategy of trying to modify the shields to defend against the Krenim torpedoes is not working, and the ship is being decimated. But Janeway staunchly disagrees; if they separate, they will be unable to pool their talents and will be even more vulnerable. They will stay on the ship as long as the ship remains in one piece. Chakotay accepts this, as Lt. Paris hails them from the bridge and informs them of yet another attack. Day 47 Chief Engineer Torres and Ensign Kim are trapped in a dark, debris-strewn turbolift car. Torres has been seriously injured. The two have been there for six hours. They pass the time playing "Guess what I am thinking of" games. Torres, despite her pain, stubbornly tries to think of the answer to Kim's latest puzzle, but then Seven of Nine pries the door open and frees them. She informs them that the last attack rendered the entire turbolift system nonfunctional. Torres wants to go to the Jeffries tubes on Deck 11 to try to repair the EPS relays there, but Kim insists that she go to the Doctor, who has set up triage in the mess hall. She agrees, and Seven goes in her stead. Meanwhile, on the bridge, in front of the flickering master systems display, Janeway, Chakotay and Lt. Paris discuss an idea that Paris has come up with: using transverse bulkheads to seal off sections of the ship in the event of a breach, a very real possibility, given the ship's current state and the Krenim attacks. Janeway agrees. The Doctor hails from the mess hall and calls Paris, a trained medic, to assist him. Paris hurries off to the mess hall. On Deck 11, Seven opens a Jeffries tube hatch. But just as she is about to climb in, she sees an object lodged in the tube's wall. She climbs in, moves close to it and scans it with a tricorder. It is, in 20th century wartime terms, a UXO (unexploded ordnance), namely an undetonated Krenim chroniton torpedo. She urgently hails Tuvok and informs him. He orders her to hold her position and to not try to disarm it. As Paris assists the Doctor in triage, Tuvok arrives in the Deck 11 Jeffries tube and sees the torpedo. He decides that the safest option is to cordon off the tube with a level 10 force field, in order to contain the explosion; the warhead is destabilizing and the explosion will soon occur. But Seven takes the opportunity to scan it and ascertain its temporal variance, which can then be used to finally modify the deflector shields against the torpedoes. Tuvok, however, drags her away, toward the hatch. She succeeds in finding the variance, but then the torpedo begins a low whine, the precursor to exploding. Tuvok shields Seven. But the explosion catches him in the face. Act Three Day 65 Voyager is in a terrible state. As Captain Janeway records in her log, the replicator system was severely damaged in the latest attack, forcing the crew to live on emergency rations. Environmental controls are failing. Seven decks are now uninhabitable. The crew, grimy and weary, struggle on. Janeway’s ready room is now totally wrecked. She is there working at something when Chakotay gives her a birthday gift: a silver pocket watch he replicated for her months earlier. But she tells him to recycle it; in their current condition, nonessentials are a luxury they cannot afford. Tuvok, now completely blind from the chroniton torpedo blast in the Deck 11 Jeffries tube, shaves with a straight-edge razor in the remains of his quarters. Seven of Nine comes to lead him on his morning rounds. She has devoted herself to being his eyes. Before they leave his quarters, she informs him of an idea she has developed on how to modify the deflector shields to defend against the Krenim torpedoes, using the temporal variance she measured from the torpedo that blinded Tuvok. He decides that they should go to Deflector Control to try it. But, as they make their way along the darkened, debris-strewn corridors, Chakotay's voice comes through the com system, warning of another incoming attack and ordering all hands to battle stations. Tuvok orders Seven to go to Deflector Control and bring the modified shields online, while he quickly makes his way to the bridge, feeling along the walls. On arrival on the bridge, Tuvok goes to his Tactical station. Blind, he cannot see the display, but he has the computer initiate a tactile interface, allowing him to operate the controls and read the displays by touch. Janeway and Chakotay sit with dead, weary expressions and postures in their respective command seats. Janeway orders an onscreen view of the approaching Krenim warship. She orders Lt. Paris to try to evade them while she and Chakotay tersely order Seven to hurry with the shields. Seven succeeds in bringing them online. The warship fires on them. The first torpedo misses due to Paris' piloting skills, but the second hits them squarely. But this time the hit causes no damage; Seven's modifications work perfectly. The torpedo explodes against the shields. Janeway, with a defiant sneer, orders Tuvok to hail the warship. She 'advises' them to stand down, as Voyager is no longer defenseless against them. They do not answer. With greater defiance, she orders Paris to maintain course through Krenim space. The temporal weapon ship approaches another planet, home to a race called the Garenor. Annorax orders the ship taken into orbit and the weapon to be fully powered and fired. It has the same effect as seen on the Zahl colony; every trace of civilization vanishes, as if it never existed, and the space-time shockwave created radiates out away from the planet. On Voyager, Ensign Kim reports the approach of the wave. Even if Voyager were untouched, she could not outrun it, so she has absolutely no chance now in her current ruined state. The wave hits. But the temporal shields protect her as they did against the Krenim torpedoes. However, the Krenim warship has no such protection. Janeway and the bridge officers watch, shocked as it is reduced from being a large, mighty warship to a small ship with limited armaments that would pose no threat to an undamaged Voyager. A baffled Kim reports that the ship is Krenim, but it is no longer the warship they were just facing. Chakotay scans the region from the command console between his and the captain's seats, and reports that the region has suddenly changed: before the wave, the area was filled with Krenim colonies and warships. Now there are no colonies and only a few small ships. History appears to have been changed so that the Kremim Imperium never existed. Janeway orders Kim to route the data on the wave to Astrometrics and leaves to go there, commenting that their troubles might just be over. But they are not the only ones to observe the effects of the wave. Aboard the temporal weapon ship, Obrist notes the erasure of the Krenim Imperium with great consternation. He reports to Annorax that the incursion has gone terribly wrong, for some reason. Annorax cannot believe it, insisting that their calculations were perfect. Obrist searches the sensor data and finds the explanation: Voyager's new temporal shields. They caused a discrepancy in the calculations. Annorax orders a course be set to go to Voyager. Act Four Astrometrics is as ruined as every other area on the ship. But Seven manages to get its sensors up and running, and finds its database intact. Janeway orders her to call up a previous scan of the area. It shows how the region was: under the boot of the Krenim Imperium, full of Krenim colonies. But a new scan confirms what Chakotay said: the Imperium does not now exist. History has been changed by the wave. On Janeway's order, Seven tracks its source and finds it, near the Garenor homeworld. She further notes with confusion that the sensors show that the Garenor do not exist anymore; they were erased from history by the wave. She muses that the Krenim may be responsible for the wave; they do have temporal weapons. But this makes no sense to Janeway; why would they change history to undermine themselves? She muses that there is a "piece of the puzzle still missing" She is in the midst of ordering another scan when the ship is suddenly shaken. The 'missing piece of the puzzle' arrives: the temporal weapon ship. Aboard, Obrist confirms that Voyager is generating a temporal field. Annorax orders 2 of her crew collected as samples, along with a small piece of the hull. He also orders preparations for another temporal incursion... against Voyager. He cannot have this anomalous temporal component disrupting his mission calculations. He intends to eliminate it. On Voyager, Ensign Kim reports with surprise that the entire vessel is in temporal flux, like the Krenim torpedoes; the ship actually exists outside of space-time. Chakotay rises and walks toward the viewscreen, looking at the vessel. He stops at the conn console, beside Lt. Paris. Suddenly, both men vanish, transported away. Janeway immediately orders efforts to retrieve them. Kim tries, but fails. A hail comes from the weapon ship. Janeway orders it answered onscreen. Annorax appears. He calmly but sternly tells Janeway to identify herself and Voyager, which she does. He reciprocates, and observes that Voyager is not from the Delta Quadrant. Janeway confirms this. But when she asks about the change in history, noting the erasure of the existence of the Krenim Imperium, he curtly responds that it is none of her business. When he tells her that she has 'diverted' him from his 'mission', she realizes that he is responsible for the change in the timeline. He does not deny it. He assures her that it is nothing personal, but Voyager must be erased as well, informing her that this will restore the lives of 'countless millions'. With a curt apology, he ends the communication. The ship fires its temporal weapon on Voyager. So great is its power that the temporal shields are quickly degraded. Kim reports tensely that the beam is pushing Voyager out of the space-time continuum; they are being erased from history. However, Seven scans the weapon ship and reports that its mass prevents it from achieving warp speeds in excess of warp 6. Thus, Voyager, whose top warp speed is in excess of warp 9, can escape. But Tuvok cautions that the damage the ship's structural integrity has sustained means that warp speed will cause extreme damage. But they have no choice; it is either this or erasure from history. Janeway orders Paris' transverse bulkheads be brought online, orders all hands to get away from the hull's outer sections, and, taking the helm, engages warp drive. They escape the temporal beam. But large, jagged pieces of the outer hull are seen peeling off and falling away. Day 73 Janeway calls a meeting of surviving crewmembers in the remains of the mess hall. She sadly but sternly informs them of the inability of the ship to sustain a crew any longer. She is forced to make the decision Chakotay had suggested weeks before: she orders them to abandon ship. The senior staff, she announces, will stay behind with her and attempt to rescue Chakotay and Lt. Paris. She dismisses them. The escape pod hatches are seen opening. The escape pods, carrying the rest of the crew, emerge from the remains of the hull and sail off into the unknown. TO BE CONTINUED... Log Entries *"Captain's log, Stardate 51268.4. This morning's attack destroyed the power grid on Deck 11. No casualties this time but the Replicator system was badly damaged. We've gone to emergency rations. As a result, the situation has gotten a little worse. Environmental controls continue to fail, seven decks have been rendered uninhabitable and we've had to relocate the crew. Quarters are close, nerves are frayed, and I'm not sure what's more difficult to maintain - ''Voyager's systems or the crew's morale. What's important... is that we're together, working towards a single goal - survival." Memorable Quotes "''Who would've thought that this eclectic group of voyagers could actually become a family? Starfleet; Maquis; Klingon; Talaxian; hologram; Borg; even Mr. Paris." : - The Doctor, giving a long-winded speech at the commissioning of the Astrometrics lab "This is turning into the week of hell." : - Captain Janeway, in a twist of irony "You have the bridge... what's left of it." : - Kathryn Janeway, to Chakotay "I don't respond well to threats." : - Kathryn Janeway, to the Krenim Commandant "With all due respect... unless you've got something a little bigger in your torpedo tubes, I'm not turning around." : - Kathryn Janeway, to the Krenim Commandant "Sir, you were correct. The Zahl homeworld ''was the focal point. Its erasure has produced a complete temporal restoration." "'Complete'?" "''Yes, sir." "If I told you to count the stars in the cosmos, would the task ever be complete?" "Sir?" "Our attempts may be sufficient; they may even be relatively successful, but they will never be complete. Choose your words with more precision." "My apologies." : - Obrist and Annorax "The ''Titanic? As I recall, it sank." " Let's just say I've made a few improvements." : - '''Captain Janeway' and Lt. (JG) Tom Paris, on Lieutenant Paris's innovation for upgrades to Voyager "Shaving is hardly a life-threatening activity." : - Tuvok Background Information *The events of this episode take place between March 16th and May 28th, 2374; Day 65 = May 20, episode ends on day 73. * The third-season episode , in which Kes travels through time, gave a preview of this episode by showing a timeline in which Voyager had already been through "The Year of Hell". Kes' timeline is not related to any timeline seen in this episode, as she is obviously no longer aboard the ship. However, at the end of "Before and After", Janeway asks Kes to give any information she has on the Krenim, which she had experienced in her time jumps, and she agrees to file a report. However, dialogue from "Year of Hell" does not reflect any of the knowledge she shared, despite having named the Krenim. * In one scene, Seven of Nine tells Harry Kim and B'Elanna Torres that the Borg were present when Zefram Cochrane launched his first warp-driven starship. She claims it is "complicated" when they ask her to elaborate. This is an acknowledgment of the events of , in which the Borg travel through time to assimilate Humans and remove their resistance, similar to what the Krenim did to the Zahl. * This was originally supposed the third season finale. The episode was given some minor rewrites with many Kes lines given to Seven of Nine. * Kurtwood Smith previously played the Efrosian Federation President in and Thrax in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode . * The stuck turbolift footage is re-used from . * This episode, along with the Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes and , the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode and the Star Trek: Enterprise episode , form a genre of episode that some fans called the "Bad Dream" or "Reset Button" episodes. In each of these episodes, catastrophic events occur (or are about to occur, in the case of "Visionary"), and then a time-change returns everything back to normal. * We find in this episode that Captain Kathryn Janeway's birthday is May 20th. * The astrometrics lab is unveiled for the first time in this episode, along with Captain Janeway's new shorter hairstyle, which she keeps for the duration of the show. Video and DVD releases *UK VHS release (two-episode tapes, CIC Video): Volume 4.4, catalogue number VHR 4625, . *In feature-length form, as part of the UK VHS collection Star Trek: Voyager - Movies: Volume 2 (with "Scorpion"), catalogue number VHR 5072, . *As part of the VOY Season 4 DVD collection. *As part of the Star Trek: Fan Collective - Time Travel collection. Links and References Guest Stars *John Loprieno as Obrist Special Guest Star *Kurtwood Smith as Annorax Co-Stars * Peter Slutsker as the Krenim Commandant * Rick Fitts as a Zahl official * Deborah Levin as Lang * Sue Henley as Brooks * Majel Barrett as the computer voice Uncredited Co-Stars *David Keith Anderson as Ashmore *Tarik Ergin as Ayala *Bob Shuttleworth as a Krenim officer References 47; antibody; astrometrics; Borg chroniton; chroniton torpedo; Cochrane, Zefram; Cray; crew quarters emergency hand actuator; emergency rations; Emmanuel; escape pod; First Contact; force field; Garenor; Grid 005; hull breach; ''Intrepid''-class; intruder alert; Krenim; Krenim Imperium; Krenim patrol ship; Krenim temporal weapon ship; Krenim warship; Kyana Prime; mess hall; Neelix; parrises squares; Phoenix; R'Cho, M'Kota; Rilnar; sickbay; spacetime continuum; Strickler; structural integrity field; tactile interface; temporal incursion; temporal shield; temporal science; ''Titanic'', RMS; transverse bulkheads; tricorder; turbolift; Vassbinder; Year of Hell, the; Zahl; Zahl starship |next= }} Category:VOY episodes de:Ein Jahr Hölle, Teil I es:Year of Hell, Part I nl:Year of Hell, Deel I